Friday, March 7, 2014

Austin Inspired Breakfast Tacos

Austin Inspired Breakfast Tacos

I am finally home from my book tour! (AKA, my epic journey across America.)  I am planning on writing a complete recap here on the blog soon, but I thought I would sneak in and post this lil diddy until then.  This post serves a few purposes.  One, to prove that it is easy to throw together a great meal in just a few minutes with just about anything you have in the house. Two, to use up the over 200 tortillas I still have left over from the New York Vegetarian Food Festival. And, three, to expose the rest of you to a phenomenon I only just learned about on a recent visit to Austin, Texas, that is the breakfast taco.


You see, I live in southern California.  Here, we take our Mexican food very seriously.  Don't get me wrong, we have our own spin on things, too.  Fresh and light dishes filled with flavor and authentic Mexican taste. I don't quite know why, then, I was so surprised to find out the fine folks of Austin take their tacos so seriously.  I mean, after all, they are also a state that borders Mexico, and they also have their own spin on things...Tex-Mex, if you will.  But the breakfast taco is something I had only heard about and never experienced on my own.  So, I went to the local Whole Foods, as it was recommended by local experts Joanna and Stephanie and ordered a few.  Impressed and inspired I vowed, right then and there, to bring the breakfast taco home with me to southern California.  And I will.  (In a much bigger way than the half-assed semi home made version pictured above.  I promise.)

Breakfast Tacos from Whole Foods Market in Austin, Texas

So, after a way-too-long-22-hour final leg home from Nebraska, through Colorado, Utah, the tip of Arizona, Nevada, and finally home to California yesterday, I didn't want to do anything but sleep.  And I especially didn't want to go to the market to get groceries.  So I slept, almost all day.  And when dinner time rolled around, I opened up a package of tortillas left over from the festival, and mixed together some TVP Taco meat, and tacos for dinner it was.

This morning, I was looking for an easy breakfast, but once again, I hadn't gone to the market yet.  I looked at what we had on hand and made up these breakfast tacos.  Keep in mind, the only fresh produce in the house was a sorry looking half bag of pre-mixed salad which was iceberg lettuce, shredded carrots and purple cabbage (I swear my husband lived off of pizza, frozen burritos, and boxed pasta dinners the entire month I was gone!)  What I would have given for fresh chopped onion and cilantro to top these.  There was one package of tofu and some salad dressings.  That's pretty much it for the fridge.  There was also a package of hash brown potato patties in the freezer.  And of course I was still hoding on to a bunch of tortillas, so to work I went.

Austin Inspired Semi-Homemade Breakfast Tacos
Below is the exact ingredients i used for these tacos, and they came out pretty tasty...however, I highly recommend adding some fresh diced onion and cilantro to the top!

Corn Tortillas (I prefer the 3 to 4 inch size, although I found it rather difficult to find this size throughout the rest of the US, so please feel free to use the standard 6 inch size for your tacos)
Hash Brown Potatoes, prepared according to package instructions
TVP Taco Meat, prepared
Taco Tofu Scramble (See below)
Lettuce, Cabbage, Carrots
Sriracha Ranch (Mix 1 tablespoon of sriracha into 1/4 cup FollowYour Heart Vegan Ranch)

Taco Tofu Scramble:
1 block of extra firm tofu, drained and pressed, and crumbled into a mixing bowl
1 teaspoon dijon mustard
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1/2 teaspoon onion powder
1/4 teaspoon turmeric
1/4 teaspoon paprika
1/4 teaspoon black salt
salt and pepper to taste
oil for frying

To make the scramble, mix all ingredients except oil in a bowl until well combined.
Add oil to a pan and heat over medium high heat.
Add tofu mix to the pan and cook until heated all the way through, about 5 minutes, tossing constantly. Set aside.
Heat a dry pan over medium high heat.  heat tortillas on each side until lightly browned.
Assemble tacos.  Add potatoes, scramble, TVP, lettuce mix, and sriracha ranch to each tortilla.
Enjoy!


2 comments:

Glo said...

These look absolutely delicious!!!!

Sarah Snell said...

Simple and delicious are the main MOTO of this recipe. Thanks for the amazing share. Really appropriated.

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